Patients confined to a bed may experience difficulty in moving in and out of the bed. In a hospital environment, many times only one nurse or aide is available to assist the patient in and out of bed. As is usually the case, in medical surgical situations, rehabilitation, or long term care situations, the patients can offer little or no help to move themselves. The patient's hips may be the total weight bearing joints to support the patient in moving from a supine to an upright sitting position at the edge of the bed. In the course of moving the patient, the patient basically is "dead" weight. The aide must bend over the bed to grasp the patient and lift, pull, and turn the patient from a mechanically unsound position. This movement may injure the patient as well as the aide.
A need has thus arisen for a device to assist in patient movement into and out of a bed whereby difficult movements and movements which may injure a patient are substantially eliminated.